This early scene in the movie is just the beginning of more deviation from the TV series by this movie.

As mentioned in my previous review, today’s post will contain my review of the second installment of the Evangelion movie titled Evangelion: 2.0 You Can (Not) Advance. This movie is the second of four movies (if the ANN is to be believed) and my review of the first movie can be read here. This is a 2009 anime, but Zan Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei will keep its throne for the time being.

The story in this anime has been heavily altered, and so are his role.

Story:-
An excerpt from my review of the first movie:-

A teenage kid was forced to become a child soldier pilot for a robot by his own father to fight some monsters called ‘Angels’. Things become difficult when it becomes clear that the boy has some ‘problems’ and his colleague-pilots don’t seem to be sane either. Can a trio of problematic robot pilots save the world from devastation?

While there are only 2 pilots in the first movie, there is another 2 added in the second, instead of one like what the TV version of this series portrayed. This early change in pilot numbers is just the beginning of many other changes, additions and omissions that this movie undergo through compared to what you can see in the TV version.

As I also predicted in the review of the first movie, the sequel indeed has deviated further away from the TV version, even more than I first thought. Unlike the two-gear pacing speed that the first movie has (early part of the movie has very fast pacing, the latter part is far slower), this movie’s pacing is more stable, but it is still fast. Let’s just say that the general pacing of this movie is in-between the first movie pacing in its first half and the pacing of the first movie’s second half. In general, if you want to make comparisons, the pacing of this movie is by far is the fastest compared to all the movie titles I reviewed before this movie, listed here.

Another obvious fact that you can observe in this anime is that the movie omits plenty of contents/stories/plots that is available in the TV series in their comparable time-frame, even more so than the first movie. This may not affect you if you haven’t watched the TV series, but if you do, some of the omissions may have a negative effect. For me, the complete omission of the arc where Shinji and Asuka fought the two-core Angel with synchronized movements is a bad decision made by whoever wrote the adaptation into this movie. That actual battle itself is not so important, but the training before the battle provides great value for character developments of both Shinji and Asuka (and their relationship too I suppose). The writers probably tried to compensate for this by modifying the original infected Eva Unit 3 arc plot by putting Asuka in it (Eva Unit 3) instead of Toji (as it is in the TV series), but it failed. IMO, if the aforementioned missing arc was included in the movie unaltered, before the altered infected Eva Unit 3 arc happened, the latter arc would have generated more impact that it currently does in the movie.

The fast pacing and many omissions (I think there are at least another two Angel arcs in the TV series removed from the movie, amongst other things), allows this movie to rapidly reached at least episode 22 or 23 of the TV series time-line. For comparison, the first movie spanned only the first 6 episodes of the TV series, but the second movie spanned the next 15 episodes or so. The next two movies is definitely going to be original stories not seen in the TV series. And I would also want to add that none of the reconstructed arcs in this second movie has surpassed their originals in the TV series, unlike the reconstructed 3rd Angel battle in the first movie that I think is better than the one in TV version.

Just like the first movie, there are some changes too happening in the movie, like the Asuka’s name change (why this happened, I don’t know), her lack of infatuation for Kaji, her obvious attention toward Shinji, her changed roles like the one in the aforementioned infected Eva Unit 03 arc and many more. Additions that was made in the second movie includes the extra additional pilot (also from Europe just like Asuka is), some original plots like the visit to the artificial aquarium and Shinji’s father visit to the moon and more. These changes and additions doesn’t have as much negative impact compared to the omissions mentioned a couple of paragraph above.

The good ending finished on a cliffhanger, kinda like Code Geass’ first season. Therefore, wait for the review of the third movie somewhere in 2013 or something.

Unfortunately for the main protagonist, so are his sexual preferences…

Character Design:-
My comment from the review of the first movie still applies.

Voice Acting:-
My comment from the review of the first movie still applies.

Music:-
The OST has regressed in quality, and the ending theme is just another variation of the ending theme of the first movie (that I didn’t like).

Animation/Direction:-
The animation quality matches the excellent quality seen in the first movie. Choreography is one of the few things that the second movie has improved from the first, with better fighting scenes in the reconstructed Angel arc and good battles in original ones. The director has stabilized the pacing compared to the first movie, but I don’t think he made a good choice of what TV arc he has omitted compared to what he includes (and made).

Conclusion:-
7 out of 10. Slightly inferior to the first movie. With this movie, the whole TV series has been rebooted, and the next two movies should have original contents. I think Gainax should have made 5 movies, with 3 for the retelling of the TV series, and 2 for whatever original contents they want to have. Too many TV series contents has been omitted for my liking, even more than the first movie.

This area has just been devastated by a nuclear bomb, but our bad-ass main protagonist simply strolled out there as if nothing has happened. Those radiations must be nothing for him.

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